The idea that the higher the human population the scarcer earth’s resources become is prevalent and mainstream. It is behind many of the doomsday alarmist calls for population control and influences much of economic theory and practice. But what if it’s wrong? Marian Tupy offers a different account. The earth’s resources and innovation actually increase the more people there are on the planet. Bringing their innovation and creativity to the table, joined with earth’s resources, humans find ways to create “superabundance.”
This is an old theme among Tech Tyrants and Libertarians. It’s understandable as a rebellion against the Malthus brand of wrongness. As usual both sides are presenting a Shared Lie, arguing about the wrong question to delist the right question.
OCKHAM!
Malthus said that populations CAN go exponential, and this is a bad thing.
Tech tyrants say that populations CAN go exponential, and this is a good thing.
Both are wrong. Nothing in nature goes exponential. Every population or life or organization goes tanh or sin. Everything experiences constant negative feedback from its surroundings. When a population has discovered a new territory, or a new way of using resources, it can grow fast for a while because the limiting feedback is small. As the animal or population grows, it gets closer to the walls and ceiling, and the bounceback gets stronger.
We shouldn’t be AIMING for exp. We should be AIMING to function in a more practical way at a steady level of population and technology and resources. We should be FIXING OUR EXISTING TECH and REMOVING CRAZY TECH instead of constantly seeking new and TOTALLY UNREALISTIC DELUSIONAL CRAZY “new frontiers”.
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ABSTRACTION is the cause of EVERY SINGLE CRASH in business, government, and ordinary lives.
Abstraction has three Ds:
(1) Debt.
(2) Delusions.
(3) Drugs.
All three are unsustainable departures from real value and real work and real measurements. Sooner or later reality crashes you.
What do the three D’s have in common? EXPONENTIAL curves, or at least attempted exponentials. Debt is obvious. Compound interest IS exp by definition. Delusions and drugs both arise from a false anticipation of constant increase in pleasure or holiness or popularity or status.
We EXPect things to be EXPonential. Reality is TANH. The DELTAS between anticipation and reality grow larger as reality departs from our desires.
Happystar illustrates the process. First our EXPonential EXPectation:
Reality goes tanh. Up at first, then reaches saturation or maturity and holds steady. Our heads are in the clouds of EXPectation and our feet are on the ground of tanh.
Now the crucial point. Our anticipations feel like the constant standard, the point we measure from. Our EXPectations are the baseline, the goal for our error-correcting feedback. We are constantly TRYING to achieve the EXPected condition. Thus our perceived reality is DOWNWARD,
Because reality is increasingly disappointing, we have an increasing desire for SOMETHING that will restore us to standard. This is where the sellers of religion or drugs or politics or hair color come in. You’re not misperceiving reality, you’re just NOT TRYING HARD ENOUGH. You need more booze, more Eucharist, more voting, more makeup.
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Contra:Does Nature ever USE exponentials?
Well, life can’t do an unending exp, because an unending exp is physically impossible. You can only get an unending exp in math. So the question narrows: Does life create AND POP bubbles intentionally?
Of course. All the time, in an infinite number of ways. Specifically, many types of neurons are pulse oscillators, repeating an exp rise followed by a natural pop. The most common neurons of all, the granule cells in the cerebellum, are pulse code handlers. Most of the action in hearing is done by pulse codes. Toward the output of each system, the pulses are smoothed into analog motions for muscles, or integrated into longer and more complex resonances for memory patterns.
In short, Nature uses all of the PHYSICALLY POSSIBLE combinations of exp and tanh. Nature rejects the only combination we believe in.
Polistra's Mill 